Pulse generator advice

[Jon Rosenstiel]

I'm thinking of purchasing a used pulse generator to be used with nuclear instrumentation. (Geiger counters, pmt preamps & discriminators, etc, etc). I would appreciate some tips as to what I should look for and what should I stay away from.

Thanks,
Jon Rosenstiel

[guest]

If you have a NIM bin, one of the reference pulsers available from the big three (Ortec, Canberra, Tennelec) might be useful. I have a Canberra pulser based on a mercury wetted relay, but haven't put it to the test yet. What I mosly use for testing my circuits is Tektronix's version of the NIM bin, the TM series of powered chassis. Tek manufatures a slew of plug-in modules for these frames. Most are available on Ebay for reasonable prices. The basic setup I use to test my circuits is a TM503 3-space rack, populated with a PG501 pulse generator, a FG501 function generator, and a DC504 counter. I use the pulse generator most of all. It has both positive and negative outputs, and very fast rise and fall times. It's the beast that generated the input waveform for my recent post abput charge sensitive amplifier waveforms. Its only drawback is that it needs a 50 ohm termination to function properly.
The only complaint I have about the whole TM series is that the controls and labeling are very small to fit in the available space, and I'm getting too old to read them easily...